Looks like there’s a bit of a concealed carry permit crisis brewing in Indiana, with an Indiana newspaper threatening to publish all the gun permit records in the state. Caleb is getting a little bit of revenge on them too. As I recently told an anti-gun commenter, I don’t have a problem with the state keeping aggregate statistics on permitting, and to be honest, until newspapers started publishing names, and sometimes even addresses, in the paper, no one really thought too much about whether the records were published or not.
Suppose I were to propose that the public has a right to know your magazine subscriptions? You might be a sexual deviant, and molest children, you know. Shouldn’t we have a right to check your mail? See what you’re downloading? Do you have high speed internet service? Are you frequenting services known to aid in the facilitation of child pornography? It’s a serious crime, and we need to keep children safe, no? OK, OK, we’ll just make you get a license to access porn on the internet. Keep the children and child molesters away. But then why not allow that list to be published? I mean, your neighbors have a right to know, right?
But now, they’ve even got you equating gun owners with sex offenders.
The analogy is more that they are treating all gun owners as potential murderers, because a very small number end up being. A very small number of porn enthusiasts are also child molesters, so using their logic, it makes sense to treat porn aficionados as if they were all potential child rapists, right?
Obviously I don’t really believe that, and I suspect most people would see a big privacy issue there, which is why I make the analogy.
I’d rather that newspapers informed the public when violent felons are being released back into the community. Just a little section, like the police blotter or the What’s Happening page. Not even all violent felons, maybe just the murderers and rapists.
But no, that’s public information that the public shouldn’t have.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again…
If you live in a “may issue” state, there MUST be some way for those have been denied a permit to see who did get approved. Without at least that minimum level of accountability, the potential for abuse is just too great.
Just one more justification for “shall issue” being the rule. Well, that or no permit required, of course.
Ok, fine. I want to publish the names and addresses of all section 8 renters, food stamp recipients, etc. If there is no good reason to keep our permit records anonymous, I see even less reason for their records to be kept private.
Think about this as well: employers might use a publicly accessable database to avoid hiring gun owners. It is their right to do so, but our government shouldn’t be providing them with the information.
Gun owner or not, the problem with Indiana is that they will whore out your state records info to anyone with a credit card. There are no secrets in the Hoosier State.
The same thing happened in Oregon. The argument here was that thieves could then target homes that are obviously known to house at least one gun. The local sheriff stopped it from leaking out, but it was a scary few months. This also happened the week I got my carry permit.
I have never understood why a group of journalists would want to threaten a whole lot of people with guns.
workinwifdakids – Because they know there’s no danger involved. We’re statistically not violent people, so there’s very little chance one of us will attack one of them. And, being generally self sufficient, in their eyes we’re the ‘wrong kind of people’ so it’s morally acceptable to them to harass us.
You’re right, Robb. And it pains me to say it, but one of these journalists will publish the name of a woman who got a CCW to protect herself from her murderous ex-husband, and one of two things will happen: either the ex will kill her, or she’ll kill the journalist.